Community Connector 

The REACH Community Connector supports REACH clients by connecting them to social activities or local organisations that are available to empower them to move forward and help ensure they don't fall back into crisis.

Advisors gently introduce Elaine, our Community Connector, to clients if they are ready for the next step. Elaine helps individuals who may be struggling personally even if their financial issues have been resolved, for whatever unique reason. This could be due to mental health struggles, recovery from addiction, loneliness, or some other reason. She assists them to build their own personal plan around what is important for them by identifying goals they may want to reach and changes they might want to make.

Benefits for clients

• Improved mental health and wellbeing
• Meeting new people and developing new friendships
• Feeling healthier and fitter
• Learning new skills
• Opportunities for volunteering & developing employment skills
• Connections with services to help with practical needs

Connections

Elaine has built strong relationships with many local organisations in Haverhill and surrounding villages over the years, giving her a huge breadth of resources, enabling her to link people to support them in the way that is tailored and most beneficial to them. People can then be introduced to groups, organisations and activities that they choose, and, if they would like, the Community Connector or a REACH buddy can attend with them initially, just to help them through the door.

We know that only together can we give hope to people who are struggling, so our partnerships are incredibly important to us. Here are just a few of the incredible local services we work with:

• Open Mind
• The Link
• Restore
• Hope Creative
• Men’s Shed
• Next Door Coffee Shop

She also has a register of 30 organisations that I can visit clients with to support them to meet new people and make a new network of friends for support.